Damn, Dog, you beat me to the punch. I read it on a nameless MSM site this AM. This after watching Hogfather on one of the local channels last night. Now I see what all the fuss is about and realize the brains behind it will be disappearing in a short matter of minutes. Truly sad.

I just hope and pray there are some medical miracles that may stave off the inevitable.

Oh, this is sad news. Thanks for the link to the article. Terry's books were a god sent to me during the year of my mother's fatal illness. His books were the only things that were able to take my mind off her illness.

LD, I wished to bring this Terry Pratchett story to your attention in case you had not heard:

"ENGLISH fantasy author Sir Terry Pratchett says he was so excited after being knighted by the Queen that he decided to make his own sword to equip himself for his new status.

It was not enough, however, simply to find some metal and get a blacksmith to bash it into shape.

Pratchett, believing the sword would not truly be his own unless it was made from metal he had produced, found a field with deposits of iron ore near his home in Wiltshire, west of London.

He gathered the deposits and smelted the iron ore himself.

The author, 62, who has sold about 65 million copies of his books, which include the Discworld series, said: "Most of my life I've been producing stuff which is intangible and so it's amazing the achievement you feel when you have made something which is really real."

With help from his friend Jake Keen — an expert on ancient metal-making techniques — the author dug up 81kg of ore and smelted it in the grounds of his house, using a makeshift kiln built from clay and hay and fuelled with damp sheep manure.

Pratchett, who has Alzheimer's disease, also said he had thrown in "several pieces of meteorites — thunderbolt iron, you see — highly magical, you’ve got to chuck that stuff in whether you believe in it or not".

After days of hammering the metal into bars, he took it to a blacksmith, whom he helped to shape it into a blade, which was finished with silverwork.

Pratchett has stored the sword, which he completed last year, in a secret location, apparently concerned about the authorities taking an interest in it.

He said: "It annoys me that knights aren’t allowed to carry their swords. That would be knife crime."